Authors

Discussion

"Imperial” and "national” ethnic mapping – practices, goals and reliability of ethnic mapping in the Balkans (1840s-1910s)

The lecture seeks to answer the question to what extent can the ethnic maps of the Balkan Peninsula created between 1840 and 1914 be considered scientific products, and to what extent did it serve the the regional agenda of Balkan nation states and of the Great Powers. Despite the evident methodological progress in the 19th c., ethnographic maps were often contradictory indicating that propaganda purposes played an important role during their preparation.

The paper focuses on (1) the discrepancy between statistical data and their visualization on maps (thus the reliability of statistics and their Western and Balkan interpretations); (2) the adequacy of applied contemporaneous visualization techniques; and (3) the difference between the quality and content of maps created for the public and those submitted to political decision-makers. To investigate these phenomena the we apply interdisciplinary methods to deconstruct dozens of maps by analysing their background data, visualization techniques, and intentions behind the maps. Then, we redrew these maps using unified categories and scaling to promote comparison of different visualization techniques. Finally, the paper tries to identify the differing characteristics of the „imperial” and „national” practises of ethnic mapping. Literature on the New Imperial History states (Osterhammel) that empires are large, multiconfessional and multiethnic, hierarchically clustered entities that use force, administration, internal collaboration and supranational symbolics to secure their existence instead of social or political homogenization or the expansion of general human and political rights (like nation states do so). So it is worth investigating how these basic differences between the two state-types can be observed in ethnic mapping.